Biased Media
Media Bias/Attack on Conservatives Caught
FEMALE REPORTER: That’s up to you because you’re the expert, but that’s what I would do…I’d wait until you see who showed up because that indicates we already know something…
[Laughter] [INAUDIBLE] FEMALE REPORTER: Child molesters…
MALE REPORTER: Oh yeah… can you repeat Joe Miller’s…uh… list of people, campaign workers, which one’s the molester?
[INAUDIBLE] FEMALE VOICE: We know that out of all the people that will show up tonight, at least one of them will be a registered sex offender.
[Laughter] MALE REPORTER: You have to find that one person…
[INAUDIBLE] FEMALE REPORTER: And the one thing we can do is ….we won’t know….we won’t know but if there is any sort of chaos whatsoever we can put out a twitter/facebook alert: saying what the… ‘Hey Joe Miller punched at rally.’
FEMALE REPORTER: Kinda like Rand Paul…I like that.
[Laughter] FEMALE REPORTER: That’s a good one.
Andrea Mitchell Exemplifies Media Bias
NewsBusters caught an example of the liberal mind in media.
In the span of a mere 50 seconds on Thursday’s NBC Nightly News, Andrea Mitchell managed to apply a conservative ideological tag four times to Pat Toomey, the Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania, yet she failed to issue even a single label for liberal Democratic candidate Joe Sestak.
Sitting at the anchor desk with Brian Williams, Mitchell made clear Toomey “is a Republican fiscal conservative who was fiscally conservative before the Tea Party was cool,” soon repeating, in the narration for her story, how “Toomey is a former Congressman and a fiscal conservative” – all before driving home his ideology once more as she recalled that he “led a conservative Washington interest group.”
Joy Behar-hater!
NPR Is a Biased Organization-which is why Mara Liasson is MIA on FoxNews (Also: Vivian on O’Reilly)
Joe Scarborough voiced the feeling of many at the time. “Well I just want to say, I love NPR and I listen to NPR, but I’ve been listening to reformed, pot-smoking hippies for the past thirty years on NPR with a very substantial left-wing bias — and I don’t care that they eat tree bark like Euell Gibbons, and I don’t care if they are still smoking pot in their sixties,” he said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” “They put on great radio. But for NPR — for NPR, the leadership at NPR to question the bias of Fox News is a joke.” (Daily Caller)
Now I know why I haven’t seen Mara Liasson on the FOX Special Report panel! Michael Eden over at Start Thinking Right has a great post on this topic entitled, “Government-Funded NPR Tries To Force Mara Liasson Off Fox News To Please White House Ownership,” in which he points out the following:
NPR reporter pressured over Fox role
By: Josh Gerstein
December 6, 2009 10:36 PM ESTExecutives at National Public Radio recently asked the network’s top political correspondent, Mara Liasson, to reconsider her regular appearances on Fox News because of what they perceived as the network’s political bias, two sources familiar with the effort said.
According to a source, Liasson was summoned in early October by NPR’s executive editor for news, Dick Meyer, and the network’s supervising senior Washington editor, Ron Elving. The NPR executives said they had concerns that Fox’s programming had grown more partisan, and they asked Liasson to spend 30 days watching the network.
At a follow-up meeting last month, Liasson reported that she’d seen no significant change in Fox’s programming and planned to continue appearing on the network, the source said.
NPR’s focus on Liasson’s work as a commentator on Fox’s “Special Report” and “Fox News Sunday” came at about the same time as a White House campaign launched in September to delegitimize the network by painting it as an extension of the Republican Party.
One source said the White House’s criticism of Fox was raised during the discussions with Liasson. However, an NPR spokeswoman told POLITICO that the Obama administration’s attempts to discourage other news outlets from treating Fox as a peer had no impact on any internal discussions at NPR.
[….]
To the best of my knowledge, Mara Liasson has never ONCE appeared on either Glenn Beck’s or Sean Hannity’s programs. She has appeared on Fox News Special Report with Brett Baier and with Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday. Unlike the Kool-aid-drinking mainstream media, Mara has been smart enough to understand the difference between news and op-ed, and she has remained on the news side.
Meanwhile, the mainstream media’s malicious and dishonest smearing of conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh was apparently NOT “biased.” CNN’s “fact checking” of an SNL sketch critical of Obama (while hypocritically ignoring months of unrelenting SNL sketch attacks against Sarah Palin) was NOT “biased.” The mainstream medias’ frequent “reporting” about conservatives “organizing” while simultaneously ignoring PAID liberal activists’ organizing was NOT “biased.”
Take a gander at MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann’s bias (see HERE and HERE) and then recognize that he is immediately followed by Rachel Maddow (see here and here), who is nearly as bad. There’s your Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity on steroids.
The mainstream media seem to love bias and propaganda, just as long as it is LIBERAL bias and propaganda. And anything LESS THAN liberal bias and propaganda sends them into a hissy fit of galactic proportions.
Michael Eden continues:
The NPR ombudsman responded to a Pew study that challenged the liberal bias of the mainstream media by saying this:
There is much that can be pointed to as examples of inherent bias in the media — including NPR.
The media — as a class — tends to be remarkably homogeneous. As an NPR editor pointed out to me recently, “How many of our journalists have ever operated a business?” The poll indirectly points to the need for more diversity in our newsrooms — both intellectual and cultural. […]
This poll may have been done correctly, but in this one aspect — questioning the professionalism of journalists — the result will be a disservice to American journalists and journalism. In order to avoid the “liberal bias” accusation, some journalists might feel there is safety in pack journalism and that is likely to have a chilling effect on tough, independent journalism.
The media and its management have an obligation to maintain a skeptical and adversarial role to whatever party is in power. This poll could discourage that by implying that journalists will always let their personal politics trump their professional obligations.
Keep in mind that for much of the 2008 election campaign, and for most of Obama’s presidency, Fox News was basically the ONLY “adversarial” voice. Fox News has in fact stood alone in avoiding the “pack journalism” that the rest of the mainstream media has pursued. Which is to say, Fox News has actually done exactly those things that the NPR ombudsman argued that the media had to do.
Here is a great example of the bias found on NPR:
Anti-Semitism can come in many forms; I would argue that when a news organization is very unbalanced in their coverage of the currant Palestinian/Israeli conflict, they are showing a bias that is feeding unhealthy views about the Semitic people and their history.
NPR is a left leaning, tax payer funded (government), radio program. Sounds somewhat fascist to me.
Read more: RPT What “Is” Fascism (Two Posts Combined & Imported from Old Blog)
Another example from the recent “flotilla incident:”
A recent segment of On Point discussing the Gaza flotilla incident provided a reminder of why National Public Radio has been referred to derisively as “National Palestine Radio”. The segment hosted by Tom Ashbrook was broadcast on June 2, 2010 in the wake of the Gaza flotilla events and featured five guests — not a single one who defended Israeli actions. The show featured:
Dianna Buttu, the Canadian-Arab lawyer who has been been faulted by CAMERA for unabashedly distorting the facts and was caught brazenly lyingKarine AFrancop (Nov. 2009) intercepted by Israel and found to be loaded with vast quantities of armaments do not count. during Israel’s Operation Cast Lead, asserting that Hamas rockets directed at Israeli towns do not contain explosives. Ashbrook introduced the former Palestinian Authority spokeswoman as an “Arab citizen of Israel.” Buttu provided her usual calumnies—”the blockade is a war crime”…”nothing linked to security”… “Israel cannot use the defense that the blockade is legal”… etc. Apparently, the two Iranian ships, the and the
Edward Peck, member of the Gaza flotilla and a friend to Hamas and Hezbollah, is associated with the Council for the National Interest, an organization that endeavors to end the close relationship between America and Israel. Peck describes the flotilla as “a humanitarian gesture, not in any way… hostile to Israel… The people were all of the humanitarian variety, ” he assured listeners. We have since learned that among that “variety” were Turkish militants seeking martyrdom.
Christopher Dickey, Middle East regional editor for Newsweek, has long contended that Israel is trying to drag the USA into a war with Iran. He reiterated this point-of-view again on the program. Dickey also falsely assured the audience that Israel, “knew there weren’t any lethal weapons to Gaza.”
Ehud Eiran was the sole Israeli representative. However, he did not present the dominant Israeli perspective. Polls have shown most Israelis solidly back their government’s stance on the blockade, but in typical NPR fashion, the person chosen to represent the Israeli perspective stated that he “does not even support the Israeli position.” On June 14, he published a piece in Newsweek describing Israel as a modern-day Sparta afflicted with a “hardening of the heart.”
Janine Zacharia, a Middle East correspondent with the Washington Post, was the only one who did not overtly criticize Israel. Neither did she defend its actions.
So there you have it – five perspectives and not one voice to present the mainstream Israeli perspective. That’s Ashbrook’s and NPR’s version of a balanced discussion on Israel.
HotAir h/t:
“Fourteen percent of NPR listeners identified themselves as Republican, 40 percent said they were Democrats and 41 percent were independent, according to a survey taken in June by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press. Among all surveyed by Pew, the breakdown was 25 percent Republican, 33 percent Democratic and 34 percent independent.
NPR QUOTES-all these people still work there?
EMILY EKINS (UCLA GRADUATE STUDENT) explains her tea party rally study and how it controverts the medias perception
NewsBusters reported Thursday, a UCLA graduate student has published a study debunking the myth that the Tea Party is racist.
On Monday, Gretchen Carlson invited the study’s author on “Fox & Friends” to do what every news outlet ought to, namely, tell the truth about what the movement that is radically changing the political landscape is really all about.
[….]
Isn’t it interesting how easily this study was done?
As Carlson asked Ekins, why haven’t any news outlets, apart from Fox News and conservative websites, done any investigation into the allegations of racism within this movement to see if they were at all true?
Yes, that was a rhetorical question, for media have been trying to either dismiss or demonize the Tea Party since its inception.
David Gregory goes fishing for answer he never gets
Newsbusters puts it like this – “Dem Senator Destroys David Gregory’s Case About Racism In Tea Party”
Democratic Senator gives David Gregory an answer he wasn’t expecting when asked about the Tea Party and supposed racism:
Maureen Dowd twists history (who are the bullies?)
NewsBusters comments on the article by Maureen Dowd’s ad hominem attack two-weeks before voting commences:
…The architect of this truly bizarre neo-feminism, Ms. Maureen Dowd, proudly wrote in her October 17 column, “We are in the era of Republican Mean Girls, grown-up versions of those teenage tormentors who would steal your boyfriend, spray-paint your locker and, just for good measure, spread rumors that you were pregnant”:
These women — Jan, Meg, Carly, Sharron, Linda, Michele, Queen Bee Sarah and sweet wannabe Christine — have co-opted and ratcheted up the disgust with the status quo that originally buoyed Barack Obama. Whether they’re mistreating the help or belittling the president’s manhood, making snide comments about a rival’s hair or ripping an opponent for spending money on a men’s fashion show, the Mean Girls have replaced Hope with Spite and Cool with Cold. They are the ideal nihilistic cheerleaders for an angry electorate.
For the record, that’s Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, California gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman, California senatorial candidate Carly Fiorina, Nevada senatorial candidate Sharron Angle, Connecticut senatorial candidate Linda McMahon, Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, Sarah Palin, and Delaware senatorial candidate Christine O’Donnell.
There was a time when America’s feminists would have celebrated and cheered such successful women entering politics and standing up to male rivals.
When the Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute’s “Pretty in Mink” calendar was released, you had a torrent of visceral hatred from the left start in earnest. Here is some commentary on this event:
(get your 2011 calendar)
The ladies are “sexy loudmouth whores” according to a blogger. Another claims the calendar is “an attempt to make erections lean to the right.” The women, they complain, “aren’t even remotely attractive.”
Some insist the calendar women aren’t actually women at all, but are in reality men in drag. Others say they’re not even people. One blogger says the ladies “look like cyborgs trying their best human impersonation.” Another calls them “mutts.”
Still another finds it incredible and “offensive” that “even one person would want to look at all these [expletive] for twelve straight months.”
[….]
The overall consensus in the left-wing blogosphere? The calendar is “weird,” “creepy,” “pathetic,” “disturbing,” “repulsive,” “revolting,” “terrifying” and “tacky as sin.” Many simply can’t understand how it wasn’t a “joke.”
So this is tolerance[?]
An interesting list from 2009 shows how Maureen Dowd conveniently forgets the history of ad hominem attack against women. Most were against conservative women!
[….]
1. Playboy’s Hate List
Playboy magazine writer Guy Cimbalo released his list of top ten conservative women against whom he’d like to commit violent sexual acts last June. Calling these acts a “hate f—” in his “So Right It’s Wrong” article, Cimbalo explained that he “might despise everything” about women like Michelle Malkin, Fox News’s Megyn Kelly, “The View’s” Elisabeth Hasselbeck, Mary Katherine Ham and Minnesota Representative Michele Bachmann, “but g–dammit, they’re hot!”
Cimbalo listed the physical attributes of each woman along with short explanations of why a self-respecting liberal male shouldn’t be attracted to them. A “hate-f— rating,” presumably to tell others just how good the sex would be, accompanied each listing as well.
Hasselbeck was described as “the clean-cut American sweetheart who elicits our filthiest thoughts.” Cimbalo labeled Bachmann the “lusty congresswoman from the Twin Cities who’s got some great twins of her own.”
As for the rating each woman received, they ranged from “chemical castration would begin to sound more appealing” to “you get this one pregnant, she stays pregnant.”
Cimbalo’s list was a disgusting example of low the media will stoop to malign conservative women. And it caused such a firestorm that Playboy removed it from its Web site.
2. Rolling Stone’s Matt Taibbi Uses Graphic Sexual Language to Discredit Michelle Malkin and the Tea Party Movement
In a Tax Day 2009 blog post, Rolling Stone’s Matt Taibbi claimed “he really enjoying this whole teabag thing” and that “it’s really inspiring some excellent daydreaming.”
Taibbi let his readers in on the nature of his daydreams that involve conservative pundit Michelle Malkin in incredibly vulgar ways.
“[T]his move of hers to spearhead the teabag movement really adds an element to her writing that wasn’t there before,” he wrote. “Now when I read her stuff, I imagine her narrating her text, book-on-tape style, with a big, hairy, set of b—- in her mouth. It vastly improves her prose.”
Nothing brings out liberals’ inner juvenile thug like an outspoken conservative woman.
3. U.S News and World Report’s Bonnie Erbe Takes Issue with Playboy List – Except for Inclusion of Michelle Malkin
It’s bad enough that liberal men don’t hesitate to speak of women in offensive, sexualized terms, but it’s beyond outrageous when a woman claims they deserved it.
But that’s just what U.S. News and World Report’s Bonnie Erbe did in the wake of the Playboy “hate f—” list.
“I’m also a firm believer in supporting all members of my gender when attacked due to their gender. I am supporting these women herewith,” Erbe maintained before noting that her “support” carried limits.
Erbe continued, “I also want to note that at least one woman on the list is so venom-spewing, she unfortunately invites venom to be shot back at her: Michelle Malkin. Her posts and her ‘routine’ are so venomous and predictable in fact, I stopped paying attention to her years ago.”
Malkin struck back at Erbe and explained the true meaning behind Erbe’s words.
“Translation: It’s not okay to talk about “hatef**king” conservative women…unless they are rowdy, incivil conservative women who don’t behave nicely enough to be on my obscure PBS show,” wrote Malkin. “In which case, they deserve all the vulgar misogynist attacks they get!”
4. Keith Olbermann Compares Michelle Malkin to a ‘Mashed-Up Bag of Meat With Lipstick on it”
MSNBC personalities reserve a special level of vitriol for conservative woman, and none more so than Keith Olbermann.
Olbermann compared Michelle Malkin to a “big, mashed up bag of meat with lipstick on it” during his Oct. 13 “Countdown” show because he believed she encouraged death threats made to a woman who posted a video of singing their praises to President Barack Obama.
“She received death threats and hate-filled voicemails all thanks to the total mindless, morally bankrupt, knee-jerk fascistic hatred, without with Michelle Malkin would just be a big mashed-up bag of meat with lipstick on it,” Olbermann stated.
Olbermann’s comments were deemed offensive enough to warrant a response from editor Megan Carpentier, an editor at liberal and now-defunct Air America Radio.
“A liberal, progressive critique of Malkin need not and should not resort to an attack on her looks or her gender or rely on silly stereotypes or imagery that brings to mind victims of domestic violence,” wrote Carpentier.
You know Olbermann went too far when even liberals are calling him out on his remarks.
5. Comedian Chuck Nice Compares Sarah Palin to Herpes
Sarah Palin is no stranger to negative media attention, but comparing her to a sexually transmitted disease takes the criticisms over the line.
During a June 9 discussion on NBC’s “Today” show about Palin’s role in the GOP, comedian Chuck Nice told his co-panelists, NBC’s chief legal analyst Dan Abrams and Politco’s White House reporter Nia-Malika Henderson, “But, Sarah Palin to the GOP, this is what I’ve got to say, she is very much like herpes, she’s not going away.”
Abrams simply responded, “That’s the advantage of being Chuck Nice. You can say that and there’s no repercussions.” Henderson did not respond. Before hosts Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb moved on to other topics, Nice informed viewers, “Everybody is laughing. I don’t care. The band is cracking up.”
Unfortunately, that’s the typical response when it comes to insulting conservative woman.
6. Toronto Star Columnist Tweets a Death Wish for Michelle Malkin
Unfortunately, as Erbe proved, it’s not only liberal men who have it out for conservative women. Antonia Zerbisias is another one.
The Toronto Star columnist expressed deep hatred for Michelle Malkin in an April 2009 Twitter message that read, “Forget the Marxists, I wish the marksmen would take @MichelleMalkin. I’m thinking Dick Cheney. He’s such a good shot.”
Apparently Zerbisias’s employer is okay with these types of remarks, as evidenced by her bio at the Star.
“Antonia Zerbisias, columnist for the Toronto Star’s Living section, has been telling people what she thinks ever since she could open her mouth,” the bio said. “Her opinionating career dates back to Grade 9 when a cartoon commentary on a teacher resulted in her suspension from high school. The principal sent her home with a note calling her ‘rude, obstreperous and bold.’ Her parents were neither amused, nor surprised. Once she was punished for being that way. Now she makes it pay.”
7. Sarah Palin = Vice-President Barbie?
ABC reporter David Wright couldn’t keep himself from comparing Sarah Palin to Barbie during his Feb. 16 “Nightline” segment on the doll’s 50th birthday.
“[Barbie’s] been an astronaut and a rock star. Pop icons Beyonce and Shakira. She’s won ‘American Idol’ too,” he began. “Some would argue she also ran for vice-president in 2008,” quipped Wright, after showing various clips of Palin.
“Caribou Barbie” was a characterization many in the media used to deride Palin throughout the 2008 election. Wright’s attack on the former Alaskan governor in a segment that had nothing to do with politics and aired three months after the election, illustrated that the media weren’t planning to back off sexist comments about Palin anytime soon.
8. Rosie O’Donnell ‘Humanized’ Conservative Elisabeth Hasselbeck
Apparently to Rosie O’Donnell, conservative women are less than human.
The former “View” moderator outlined how she tried to “humanize” her former colleague, Elisabeth Hasselbeck during the Feb. 8 broadcast of her Sirius XM radio show, “Rosie Radio.” O’Donnell’s comments stemmed from a discussion about the conservative backlash to her recent HBO documentary about families, “A Family is a Family is a Family.”
“It’s sort of what I thought about Elisabeth Hasselbeck, too. I’m going to love her, regardless of what she says, I’m gonna love her and the love, then, is going to win through in the end,” O’Donnell explained to her current colleagues. “I was positive of this, and we sort of started to humanize her. Remember, after she came to my house, she actually said on television how she thought our family was so great? Can you imagine the amount of hate mail she got from her constituency?”
9. David Letterman’s “Top Ten” List of Sarah Palin Insults
Late night talk show host David Letterman couldn’t let an opportunity to go by without trashing Sarah Palin during his June 8 show.
The usual “jokes” about Palin’s intellect appeared on Letterman’s “Top Ten Highlights of Sarah Palin’s Trip to New York,” alongside a knock on her looks. “Number Two: Bought make-up from Bloomingdale’s to update her ‘slutty flight attendant look,” read the comedian.
Then he went further, with a crude joke about her 14-year-old daughter being impregnated at Yankee Stadium. Letterman eventually was forced to apologize for that joke, but not for carried on the tradition of painting Palin as a complete bimbo, not a governor or a former vice-presidential candidate.
10. Liz Cheney, Daddy’s Little Girl?
MSNBC and liberal talk radio host Ed Schultz labeled Liz Cheney, daughter of former vice-president Dick Cheney, nothing more than a daddy’s girl during his Sept. 29 MSNBC program, “The Ed Show.”
“There’s a couple of gals who’ve been riding the wave of crazy that’s been sweeping the nation’s right-wingers: ‘Shooter’s little girl, Liz Cheney, has been hitting the lecture circuit, parroting daddy’s fear-mongering rhetoric,” stated Schultz.
Of course, Liz Cheney is no simple “daddy’s girl.” She holds a law degree from the University of Chicago, and served as the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs.
A liberal woman with the same qualifications as Cheney would never be categorized as a “daddy’s girl” but as an empowered woman in her own right.
Which is why SGP (Smart Girl Politics) is asking conservative women to join a list:
But over the next 19 days, the liberal media will do everything in their power to put conservative women in a bad light.
That’s why Concerned Women for America — America’s largest women’s public policy organization — is rallying thousands of women across the nation to say…
“I’m Conservative and I WILL VOTE!”
Already, our campaign has reached tens of thousands of conservative women. But we must do more to counter the efforts of the liberal media and groups like EMILY’s List
that are rolling out multi-million dollar campaigns to sway women voters.
As a first, vital step, I’m asking you to join me in making a simple yet powerful statement. Go here to join me and thousands of conservative women who are taking a stand in this election year:
http://www.cwfa.cc/r.asp?u=33665&PID=26377908
Our goal is to reach out to hundreds of thousands — if not millions — of conservative women voters who can then engage their friends as well.
LIAR! Obama lied and knew no shovel ready jobs existed (this is what he pushed the stimulus through with though)
From HotAir:
And of course, this wouldn’t have been news all the time while Barack Obama kept claiming that these “shovel ready jobs” had prosperity just around the corner, right? Brooks says that the admission came in an off-the-record session with the President, which kept him from reporting it. I wonder if Brooks or anyone else would have been that particular had George Bush admitted “off the record” that he knew Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction in 2003 or 2004, while continuing to make the argument that the war was necessary because of them. What happened to sourcing as “a senior administration official”? Did it not occur to Brooks that Obama was lying about these jobs over the past year to defend his economic policies, and that Brooks might have had a responsibility to make that known? Good to know that the New York Times prints all the news that fits — its agenda.
[….]
Sounds as though Brooks’ information shows that the administration has lied all along. But at the Times, that’s not news.
This media bias should be more than apparent, and the disdain for real news because of the smirk Brooks had on his face the whole time he talked about this issue of him knowing. It is elitism on display and it makes me sick to think the President and the mainstream media thinks its okay to lie to the general public.
Cartoon Banned from Washington Post
some recent examples of media bias-as if we need any more
In April of 2010 The Hill ran a story about a poll that mentioned the following:
Four in 10 Tea Party members are either Democrats or Independents, according to a new national survey.
The findings provide one of the most detailed portraits to date of the grassroots movement that started last year.
This number has grown, but CBS finds “Independent” voters who all bash the Tea Party? How can this be? Did the people who were sent out to hunt down these panelists think that in order to be an Independent voter they cannot like the Tea Party? Whatever the reason, everyone of these “Independents” dislike the Tea Party. What we have here is just more media bias as shown below: